7.  The applicants were born in 1965, 1978 and 1999 respectively. They live in Vilhelmina.
8.  The applicants requested asylum in Sweden on 28 December 2007. They stated that they had lost all their identity papers in the 1994 war. They had left Russia by lorry on 14 December 2007 because they were under threat from “Kadyrov’s group” [Ramzan Kardyrov], which had arrested and tortured the first applicant. They arrived in Sweden on 23 December 2007.
9.  On 7 March 2008 legal counsel was appointed to the applicants, who made the following two written submissions before the Migration Board (Migrationsverket).
10.  In the first submission of 9 April 2008 the applicants stated the following: The first applicant was of Chechen origin and a Muslim. The second applicant was partly of Ukrainian and partly of Chechen origin, and a Russian Orthodox. Between 1983 and 1985, the first applicant performed military service, following which he had worked as a carpenter and then as an apprentice at a periodical until 1992. In the beginning of 1995 he had worked at a hospital, helping wounded people. On 25 February 1995 he had been injured as a result of an explosion outside the hospital. In 1995 he had met a man called H, who accompanied the first and the second applicant to a mountain village. They had stayed there for twelve years until 6 October 2007. H had given the first applicant a camera in order to document the executions of villagers committed by the Russian federal troops. The first applicant had taken photographs and written reports concerning several such executions. The “Kardyrov group” had been behind all those executions. The material had been sent to different television broadcasting companies, including the BBC. In return he had been provided with food. On 6 October 2007 the first applicant had received news that his wife and child had been kidnapped by the Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation ("the FSB"). The second applicant had been tortured and raped for several days. On 11 October 2007 she had heard a male voice asking her and the child to be quiet and follow him. They had gone through a gate where another man was waiting for them and then hidden in a house in a village. On 31 October 2007 they had gone to another village where they stayed until 13 December 2007 when she was taken to the first applicant, with whom she and their child were reunited the following day. In the meantime, on 9 October 2007, while searching for his family, the first applicant contacted a military guard, who arrested him. The first applicant was wanted as a key figure and an agent had informed the FSB about him. There was a price on his head of 10.000 dollars. The first applicant had been detained in a cellar and forced under torture to provide information about the rebels, their hiding places and various radio signals. The torture included having a cross burned into his chest with cigarettes. After some time, he had been taken to a forest to be shot. He had been told to run, whereupon the FSB had fired at and hit him three times. He had lost consciousness. By chance he had survived and woke up on 11 October 2007 at a camp where he had been taken by rebels and where he had been operated on by a doctor. The latter told him that two rebels had been near to the place of his planned execution, had fired at the FSB officers and thereby prevented his execution. H came to see him on 14 October 2007 and informed him that he would be killed either by the FSB or by the rebels, who considered him as a traitor because he had revealed information about the rebel group under torture. H had therefore encouraged the first applicant to commit suicide. On 15 November 2007 he had confirmation that his wife and child were alive. Immediately after they were reunited on 14 December 2007, the family had left Russia.
11.  In a second written submission of 13 May 2008 the applicants added, inter alia, that the first applicant had previously worked with Amnesty International. Through this work he had come into contact with the journalist Anna Politkovskaja. His first contact with her had been in the year 2000. He had met her several times after that and provided her with information. The first applicant suspected that the reason why he was wanted was related to Anna Politkovskaja’s archives becoming available to opposing interests in connection with her death.
12. On 16 September 2008 the Migration Board held a meeting which lasted approximately three and a half hours and included interviews with the applicants in the presence of an interpreter and their legal counsel. The first applicant stated, amongst other things, that before the war he had worked as correspondent for a small newspaper. After having met H in 1994 the first and second applicant had moved to the mountain village and joined the rebels. He met Anna Politkovskaja only once, in February 2002. After that he had begun to forward copies of his work to her and to H. He had spoken with her on the telephone and she had planned to write a book about him. Her assistant had photographed them on the day they met. He had documented an estimated total of over a thousand crimes between 1995 and 2007. It was R, a man he worked together with as a journalist, who had told him that he was wanted by the occupying authorities. Having been subjected to torture and an execution attempt, he had learned in October 2007 that his wife and child were alive and they were reunited on 13 December 2007. The second applicant added that she had been physically and verbally abused by her kidnappers because she was not a “pure” Chechen. Before the Migration Board the applicants submitted three letters dated August 2008 from private persons of Swedish nationality, and a medical certificate dated 17 April 2008 which stated that the first applicant had wounds on his body which had “a good relation” with his explanation both of the timing and the extent of the torture to which he had allegedly been subjected.
13.  By decision of 25 October 2008 the Migration Board refused to grant the applicants asylum. It observed that the applicants had no documents to prove their identity. However, it found it established that they originated from Chechnya. It did not find that the situation there or the general situation for Chechens in the Russian Federation alone could justify the granting of asylum. It went on to assess the applicants’ situation individually and found, notably, that the first applicant’s story had been incoherent and in part clearly inconsistent in that:
i)  on 9 April, 13 May and 16 September 2008 he had given divergent explanations about when and how many times he had met Anna Politkovskaja; the first time he did not mention her at all, the second time he said he had met her as from 2000 and several times, and most recently he said he had met her only once in 2002;
ii)  the first applicant had not been able to show or point to any of the pieces of documentary work that he had allegedly produced over twelve years during the period from 1995 to 2007, nor had he substantiated having worked as a journalist anywhere. It also noted, as to the first applicant’s suspicion that he was wanted due to the journalistic information furnished by him and found in Anna Politkovskaja’s archives, that the latter had died on 6 October 2006 and that the applicants had had no problems for a whole year thereafter;
iii)  the first applicant had provided divergent information about when he had been told that his wife and child were alive, in that originally he gave the date of 15 November 2007 and later changed this to October 2007;
iv)  apparently he had been able to stay at the camp until he was reunited with his family in December 2007, despite having been advised to commit suicide in October 2007 by H. Finally, the Migration Board did not find that the first applicant’s injuries were sufficient to substantiate his motive for asylum. The Migration Board concluded that the applicants had not substantiated their request for asylum, which was consequently refused.
14.  In a separate decision concerning the second applicant, the Migration Board noted her statement that she had been ill-treated by her kidnappers because she was not a “pure” Chechen. The Board found this statement to be remarkable if the kidnappers were indeed representatives of the FSB. The Board also noted that she had not been able to identify her kidnappers and considered that her statements about how she had been able to leave the building where she had been detained did not appear credible. In view of this, and the fact that the second applicant had not claimed to be personally threatened by the FSB or anyone else before or after this incident, the Board did not find that she had made probable that she was in need of protection. Accordingly, she could not be regarded as a refugee or as an alien otherwise in need of protection within the meaning of the Aliens Act.
15.  On appeal to the Migration Court (Migrationsdomstolen), the applicants were heard on 17 June 2009 in the presence of an interpreter and their legal counsel. The first applicant had stated that he had heard about Anna Politkovskaja in 2000 and that they had met in 2002 in Chechnya, where he had contacted her. He had not been in touch with her prior to that, and his subsequent contacts with her were through a contact person who gave him tapes to use in his work. He had sent all his material to this person in secret. The family were living in hiding when his wife and daughter were kidnapped. He had known that he was wanted at this time because people who had seen flyers in Grozny had told him so. No one in the mountain village had informed against him. The second applicant stated that she had received protection from H after she had escaped from her kidnappers. The applicants submitted a medical certificate of 13 November 2008 concerning the first applicant stating, inter alia, that he showed signs of post-traumatic stress disorder.
16.  By judgment of 15 July 2009, the majority of the Migration Court, (two members including the judicial judge) upheld the decision of the Migration Board. It agreed with the conclusion that the general situation in the Russian Federation was no ground for asylum as such and that an individual assessment should be made. It also found that the first applicant’s injuries had probably been caused by ill-treatment resembling torture. However, even though the evidence supported his statements, and taking into account that victims of torture cannot be expected to provide completely coherent and consistent statements, the Migration Court did not consider that the first applicant had made probable why he had been subjected to abuse and by whom. In assessing the first applicant’s credibility, the Migration Court noted that he had changed his statements several times on central points. Regarding his alleged contacts with Anna Politkovskaja, the Migration Court noted, in addition to the discrepancies pointed out by the Migration Board, that in the request for appeal, it was stated that the first applicant had been in telephone contact with Anna Politkovskaja on several occasions, starting in 2000. During the oral hearing, on the other hand, he had stated that he had only met her once in 2002 and had had no contact with her before or after that, except through a contact person. Furthermore, the Migration Court noted that it was unclear how he had established contact with Anna Politkovskaja in the first place. According to his submission of 13 May 2008, he had met her when he worked for Amnesty International. However, during the oral hearing before the Migration Court he had stated that he had sought contact with her through contact persons who worked in the same field as he did. As to the first applicant’s alleged journalistic work, the Migration Court noted that the description of his activities had been remarkably vague, and that although he claimed that he had collected material for several years he had not been able to provide any concrete examples of what he had done. Nor had he been able to provide any form of evidence of his work. Thus the Migration Court found reason to question the credibility of the applicants’ statements. Two members of the Migration Court dissented and found that the divergences in the applicants’ explanation concerned insignificant issues and that the applicants could not substantiate their story more than they already had done.
17.  Leave to appeal to the Migration Appeal Court (Migrationsöverdomstolen) was refused on 16 October 2009.
18.  On 16 November 2009 the applicants lodged a complaint with the European Court of Human Rights and requested the application of an interim measure pursuant to Rule 39 of the Rules of Court. On 20 November 2009, the Court applied such an interim measure and requested the Swedish Government to stay the applicants’ expulsion to the Russian Federation until further notice.
19.  On 15 December 2009 the application was communicated to the Government and at the same time, the applicants were requested to furnish information about whether, before joining the rebel group in 1995, the first applicant had had any journalistic or photographic training and whether he had ever worked officially as a journalist or photographer. In the affirmative, he was requested to submit documentation in this respect or point to work he had produced. Moreover, he was requested to submit documentation or evidence of work, such as articles, tapes, photographs and so on that he allegedly produced during the period from 1995 to 2007 or, if this was impossible, to explain why, and as an absolute minimum, to provide a detailed description of the documentary material which he allegedly produced. In addition, he was requested to furnish detailed information about which documentary material produced by him was used by whom, be it persons, journalists, institutions, NGOs and so on.
20.  In reply to the first question, the applicants stated that the first applicant had commenced as an apprentice in 1985 at a local newspaper and there learned about the work of a photographic journalist. After two years he had started to work part time as assistant to the photographic journalist at the paper until 1992 when the printing house was closed. Subsequently, besides having other jobs, he had prepared himself for entrance exams at the university’s Faculty of Journalism, but had never entered due to economic sanctions in 1993 and the war in 1994. The material from his photographing and reporting of the execution of villagers were sent to television broadcasting companies. It was probably more accurate to say that the first applicant had worked in journalism rather than that he was a journalist.
21.  As to the Court’s request for documentation or evidence of the first applicant’s work, the Court received a compilation of work allegedly produced by the first applicant during the period from 1995 to 2007. He contended that he was not in possession of any articles where his name was mentioned. He did not develop on the link between his work and the compilation of incidents. In addition, the first applicant submitted one example of an article, translated from Russian, entitled “March 1996, ‘human shield’ in Samashki” which was allegedly based on his work. It could be found on a named internet site.
22.  The Government noted in that respect that the compilation merely contained a description in brief and general terms of different incidents in Chechnya, which were already available through open sources, including the internet, and that there was no explanation as to how these incidents were related to the first applicant’s work, if at all. In any event, the Government doubted that it would have been possible for the first applicant to move around so frequently and carry out all those alleged journalistic activities in so many different places, as implied by the submitted compilation, considering that since 1994 he had not been in possession of any identity papers. Finally, the example of the article allegedly based on the first applicant’s reports did not contain a single reference to him, although the English translation on the internet, in most of its footnotes, carried a reference to the source, or to the person who had recorded a certain statement, and information about where the incident took place and when.